A general characteristic common to patients suffering from temporary paralysis due to trauma, hernia, longtime lying in bed, or just simply old age is the fact that although such patients may have a healthy neuro-activity necessary for limbic motion, their muscles and/or nerves are damaged.
Rehabilitation for damaged muscles and/or nerves is currently done mainly in rehabilitation centers where patients are under the care of physiatrists, rehab nurses, occupational therapists and physical therapists and undergo specific physiotherapy programs aiming at recovering the damaged element in the muscle and/or nerve. Physical therapists also use hot and/or cold packs as well as ultrasound systems which use high frequency waves to produce heat.
The costs associated with muscle nerve regeneration can be enormous. For instance, “according to statistics reported by the Foundation for Spinal Cord Injury Prevention and Cure, the lifetime medical costs for paraplegia are $1 million. The lifetime medical costs for quadriplegia range from $1.5 million to $3 million. The statistics do not include lost wages or other financial losses” (http://www.georgiaaccidentlaws.com). Effective, but cost-saving rehabilitation systems for the home use are therefore desirable.
US 2011/0213266 A1 discloses a closed loop, neural activity triggered rehabilitation device and method for facilitating recovery of a patient from the effects of a sensory motor disability. The device includes a sensor system positionable adjacent the brain of the patient for detecting neural signals. A functional stimulation component is operatively connectable to at least one body part, such as a muscle or a nerve. The functional stimulation component stimulates the at least one body part in response to the neural signals detected. A sensory stimulation module is operatively connected to the patient to provide sensory feedback thereto.
While such closed loop systems have shown advantageous recovery effects for the patients, the recovery of the patient still progresses very slowly, with many set-backs and very small steps forward that are difficult, if not impossible, to perceive by the patient especially in the beginning Not being able to perceive the benefits of the treatment commonly leads to patient discouragement, lack of trust and adherence to the program or device, thereby impeding the rehabilitation process. Many patients expect a very fast recovery and if no such fast recovery may be perceived by the patient, they mistrust the functionality of the device. Known devices are often lacking to give the patients a feedback about the recovery process as well as to support the patients to exercise the movement of their impaired limb. User-adherence to such devices is therefore in most of the cases quite low.
Thus, there is still room for improvement.
US 2006/0195042 A1 discloses a system and method for a biological interface system that processes multicellular signals of a patient and controls one or more devices. The system includes a sensor that detects the multicellular signals and a processing unit for producing the control signal based on the multicellular signals. The system further includes an automated configuration routine that is used to set or modify the value of one or more system configuration parameters.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,692,517 A discloses a method and apparatus for assisting a user to control a device in response to a combination of electroencephalographic and electromyographic potentials.